BIRMINGHAM, Alabama -- Cooper Green Mercy Hospital has more than $1 million in unpaid invoices for medical and laboratory supplies six months after being cut off from the county's ailing general fund, according to county records reviewed by The Birmingham News.

Hospital officials said Thursday they are still adjusting to paying their bills without getting cash from the general fund.

"The county was paying every week and, in order for us to take some control over what we were doing, we started paying twice a month," said Dr. Sandral Hullett, chief executive office of the county-owned hospital. "Yes, there is a problem, but we are working to resolve it. We should be caught up with this in another month."

The Jefferson County Commission voted last summer to stop letting the hospital dip into the county's general fund. That meant, in terms of county funding, the hospital now operates entirely from within the indigent care fund, which is dedicated solely to Cooper Green.

Many invoices are still being paid and services are not in jeopardy, Hullett said. "Anytime there is an emergency or something has to be done, we'll do it," she said.

Hullett said a number of factors are partly to blame for the late payments, including the layoffs of hundreds of county workers last summer -- some of whom may have helped process checks in the finance department -- and county's record-setting bankruptcy.

County Manager Tony Petelos said he called a meeting last week between his chief deputy and hospital officials to assess the matter.

"We are trying to get to the bottom of why are these bills not being paid," Petelos said. "We're trying to deal with it from our end on how we can prevent these problems from happening in the future."

Commissioner Jimmie Stephens said hospital leaders were told in June they would need to "sharpen their pencils and control their costs" once told they could no longer tap into general fund revenue.

"The financial responsibility was given to them with the understanding that they would do what was necessary for them to live within their budgetary constraints," Stephens said.

The county's fiscal 2012 general fund budget stands at $217.8 million. That's already $94.6 million less than the budget approved the previous year and $40 million short of being in balance, according to the county.

Hullett said losing access to the general fund meant a "change of structure for the hospital."

"It did have an effect, but it doesn't mean we can't pay the bills," she said. "It's not all good, but it's not all bad either."

A report last year showed that Cooper Green in fiscal 2010 got $9 million from the county's general fund and $41.2 million from the indigent care fund.

Payment of some contracts are being held up because of negotiations between lawyers, Hullett said.

"Maybe the county lawyer might want some specific term in it and the other company doesn't agree with it," Hullett said. "And they go back and forth. The lawyers have to agree on the contract and the changes."

Efforts to reach county lawyers for comment on Thursday were unsuccessful.

The county has had outstanding invoices for a number of entities, including Medical Data Systems Inc. of Florida; Beckman Coulter, an Illinois-based supplier; and The University of Alabama at Birmingham, according to the county's purchasing department records from the past two months.

The purchasing department is responsible recommending contracts and submits a list to the County Commission finance committee for approval.

The hospital has unpaid bills for hematology supplies; chemistry supplies; blood supplies and a number of other areas that range in amounts from $365,961 to $461, according to the records.

Some vendors say they plan to work with the county.

"UAB and the UAB Health System continue to furnish many services to Cooper Green," UAB spokesman Clinton Colmenares said. "We are amicably working with Cooper Green to collect past due payments and secure ongoing contractual arrangements for current and future services. We fully expect to reach a mutually beneficial agreement."

John Garrett, chief finance officer for Cooper Green, said some of the companies on the purchasing report have been paid and he's in the process of compiling a list of those owed money.

Garrett acknowledged that the hospital is behind on some invoices that date back more than 12 months. The county had been paying the current invoices first, instead of the ones that had been unpaid for 30 days or longer, he said.

"I don't know specifically why that occurred," he said. "We may have an invoice outstanding in July 2012 and we have another one in August and, for whatever reason, August may get paid and July not. We are working on trying to straighten those things out, but it takes time."

Hullett and Garrett said the county's financial department had the duty of making the payments before the commission voted to hand that responsibility to the hospital.